Choir directors are prized stock in a faith community. The church choir I sing in will lose its supremely talented choir leader at the end of the spring because his spouse is headed off to earn a professional degree, and we dread the relationship ending. You simply grow attached to the person who magically gets the best out of your larynx and give majesty to choral music.
It must have been devastating Tuesday night for the Mormon Tabernacle Choir to learn that its music director, Craig Jessop, was resigning The Deseret Morning News in
Salt Lake City reported it came as a surprise to everyone.
We cried. We stood up spontaneously and started to applaud, one choir member reported. But that doesnt even begin to say how we feel. We were just stunned. There are no other words for it. We never saw it coming.
Jessop took over the worlds most famous choir in 1999 and had been the associate director, starting in 1995. He told the choir at the end of their Tuesday night rehearsal by reading a letter, which some choir members said they, at first, thought was about someone else resigning. Then it began to dawn on them, wrote Carrie A. Moore of the Deseret News. Later in a church-issued press release, Jessop said, I now find myself at a major crossroads of life. With long and prayerful consideration, I have decided to resign as director of the choir.
He said he would remain active in music, including teaching it. He and his wife, RaNae, and family looked forward to more time together, the choirmaster explained. The choirs president, Mac Christensen, said Jessop had taken the Mormon Tabernacle Choir to great heights in its performances and tours. The story said that, under Jessop, the choir had launched a private record label in March 2003. It released several albums, with some of them getting to No.1 on Billboards Classical Music chart. During the 2002 Winter Olympics in Utah, the Tabernacle Choir performed 20 times, including the opening ceremonies.
The popular Music and the Spoken Word, which can be seen on cable channels, including the Brigham Young University cable channel, and on radio is a media fixture going back to 1929. In April 2004, the choir and Music and the Spoken Word were inducted into the National Association of Broadcasters Hall of Fame.
Mack Wilberg becomes interim director of the massive choir of 325 men and women. Choir members do the demanding rehearsals and performances without compensation. Some commute 164 miles round trip a couple times a week to fulfill their choral responsibilities with the MTC, which calls itself Americas Choir.
